


My Year In Metropolis

by Emma_with_her_head_in_the_clouds



Category: Superman - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Gen, Spin-Off
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-24
Updated: 2018-01-31
Packaged: 2018-09-26 16:14:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 13,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9910757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emma_with_her_head_in_the_clouds/pseuds/Emma_with_her_head_in_the_clouds
Summary: Rebecca was working as a small-town GP until her husband Jon's work lead to them moving to Metropolis for a year. Rebecca plans on becoming a writer, but her life becomes much more exciting when they make new friends, one of which turns out to be Superman!





	1. Prologue/Chapter One

Prologue:  
I was pretty surprised when my husband had first broached the subject of relocating to America.  
"It would only be for a year. Less even. It would be a great career opportunity, and you know I've always wanted to live abroad for a while."  
I was less keen on the idea of living abroad, and besides, I would have thought the phrase would be better applied to somewhere more culturally different, somewhere we'd have to learn a new language (not that I was ever any good at languages). The US had always seemed to me to be pretty similar to the UK, just everything is bigger and they have some weird eversion to the letter U. The move might be good for his career (the company he worked for was expanding, and wanted him to help set up one of the new offices, and get it up and running), but it wouldn't be so great for mine. I was working as a GP in a nice little small town practice. It wasn't as exciting as some of the placements I'd been one whilst I was training, but I liked it. Of course, I could become a doctor over in America too (and get paid a lot more than I'd been earning I would expect), but it would require me taking a whole set of exams and getting registered over there, and it seemed like a lot of farce to go to if we were going to be there less than a year.  
"You could take a sabbatical. You're always saying you wish you had more time to work on your writing. Plus think of all the extra experience and inspiration you would get." That was a fair point. I had always enjoyed writing, ever since I was little. I kept trying to work on books, writing down massive lists of ideas, but never really finding time to develop them further or get past the first few chapters.

It seems silly what actually clinched the decision. It was that we would be moving to Metropolis, the home of Superman. I had always been fascinated, watching him on the news. There was just some part of my inner child that couldn't pass up on the chance of moving to his city, where I might get to glimpse him flying over my head, even see him heroically saving the day perhaps. I never dreamt that it would be so much more than that…

Chapter One:  
Once we'd made the decision to move, everything seemed to happen so quickly. In what seemed like no time at all, I'd handed in my notice, all our stuff had been boxed up and put into storage, our house was rented out and we were half way round the world. We'd brought the minimum amount of stuff across with us. Well of course, Jon argued that I could have brought far less stuff, especially far less shoes, but I'd not been used to having to travel light since uni, and I'd amassed a lot more possessions since then. I wasn't going to bring any less than I had done, and he didn't want to argue the point too much, in case he made me change my mind about the whole move. 

He'd organised renting us out an apartment, and I had to admit, he'd done a pretty good job. Of course it was smaller than our house back home, but that was in the suburbs, not in the middle of a large city. It was modernly furnished and had a view out across the city. You couldn't see too far until the many towering office blocks blocked each other out, but you could see Jon's new office block, and near it, the big globe of the Daily Planet newspaper. I'd seen it in the background of photos of Superman before, but didn't know much about the paper itself. I bought a copy on the day we moved in, but it seemed much the same as other newspapers I'd read (I wasn't much of a newspaper reader to be fair, having gotten used to mainly hearing about the world through Facebook). 

If I'd paid more attention to the newspaper, I probably would have been more excited when we met our new neighbours. We'd unpacked most of the stuff we'd brought with us on the plane (the rest of the things that we had decided to bring would be coming in a few days) and were heading out to find something for tea (we were both pretty jet-lagged so wouldn't have fancied cooking even if we actually had some food in). As we headed out of our door, we almost walked straight into the couple who we're opening their door across the hall.  
"Oh, hi. Sorry, I didn't see you there. I'll have to get used to living in an apartment building and remember I can't just come barreling straight out of my door."  
"It's fine. Have you guys just moved in?" the woman asked. She had shortish brown hair and was quite smartly dressed. She smiled, in a look that was both friendly and curious.  
"Yes, today. Jon's job wanted him to relocate here for the year, so here we are!"  
"Oh wow. So where have you moved from? I am right in thinking you're English?"  
"Yep, we've come across the pond. Start of a whole new adventure. Starting with an expedition out to get food. What restaurants would you recommend round here?"  
"There's a nice little Italian place just across the street from here. But actually, if you don't fancy going out, we're just about to order food in, if you'd like to join us?" Her partner shot her a slightly surprised look; not disapproving of the invite, just that he hadn't expected her to make it. I looked at Jon and shrugged.  
"That would be lovely thanks, if it's ok with you both?" he replied back to them, "I'm Jon by the way, and this is my wife Rebecca." The man shook his hand. He was also quite smartly dressed. There was something quite familiar about his face, but at that point I thought maybe it was the glasses, which were quite generic, and similar to ones I’d seen on many people before.  
"Sure, come on in," he said, opening the door and gesturing inside, "I'm Clark, and this is my wife Lois."

Their apartment was quite similar to ours, except looking more furnished and lived-in (it was a little bit messy, but less cluttered than our house back home had been- clearly they weren't as bad as me at collecting junk everywhere). I glanced at an award on the side, doing a double take and going to have a closer look when I spotted the title on it.  
"Is that a Pulitzer!?" I wasn't a hundred percent sure what they were awarded for (I knew it was writing of some kind), but knew they were a big deal. Lois beamed, whilst Clark looked sarcastically frustrated.  
"Why, yes it is. I won it for a piece I wrote about meeting Superman. Clark and I are both journalists at The Daily Planet you see. Although, he 's not won a Pulitzer…" She looked across at him, smugly.  
"You've met Superman!?" I asked her surprised and in awe.  
"Oh yes, I know him quite well. I'm sure if you're staying around Metropolis, you might just get to know him too…" She and Clark shared a knowing look, like they were sharing an in joke (one which I didn't get at the time). 

Clark changed the topic away from Superman (and drew us away from Lois' Pulitzer).  
"So what do we want to eat? There's quite a few different places that deliver round here" he said whilst grabbing a heap of takeaway leaflets from a drawer.  
"Or you could always pop out an fetch something" Lois suggested to him, pulling the same cheeky knowing look as before.  
"Oh no, that's fine. We don't want to be an inconvenience," Jon interjected, "We'll have whatever. You choose; I guess you guys know which places are good round here."

We ended up ordering Chinese food and opened a bottle of wine and sat around talking whilst we waited for it to arrive.  
"So what do you do for work then Jon?" Clark asked, "What brought you two to Metropolis?"  
"I work for Mayrkro. You might have heard they're opening a new office here. They've asked me to run it, whilst it gets off the ground."  
"Wow. Well I know who to come talk to then if I hear rumours of shady goings on there or something haha." Clark joked.  
"Using friends to try and get and an exclusive again I see?" Lois joked back at him.  
"Well, you're one to talk!"

At first I kept worrying that I was going to cause an argument when they kept making zings at each other, but I soon learnt that they did it all the time, and was just a consequence of them both being very competitive people. It seemed to work for them. As much as I love Jon, I couldn't imagine working alongside/against him. But their twin journalistic careers were just another thing for them to be competitive about.

"And what about you Rebecca?" Clark asked, as Jon and I sat silently tried to discern the mood surrounding their bickering, "What do you do?"  
"Well I was a GP, but I'm taking some time out from my career whilst we're over here to work out some personal projects."  
"She's writing a book," Jon added. I hadn't been planning on mentioning that unless they asked; now I knew they were professional journalists (one of which had even won a Pulitzer!), my silly little writing attempts seemed pathetic in comparison. Writing a book seems like the kind of cliché thing everyone tries to do. Very few of them actually finish, and an even smaller number of the finished works are actually worth reading. I was starting to think I was probably wasting my time trying to write; I would be much better spending the time studying and getting the US medical registration exams dealt with, and actually doing something useful with my time whilst I was over here. But Jon had told them now, and they did genuinely look interested (or at least were doing a good enough impression to not look like they thought the idea was hilariously cliché).  
"Oh cool, what's it about?" Lois asked.  
"I'm not sure yet. I've got a few books started on my laptop from over the years, but thought I might start something new whilst I'm over here. Get some new inspiration from a new city."  
"Well I'm sure you'll find lots of inspiration in Metropolis; let me know when you do, I'd love to read it and see your interpretation of the city. Plus, I might even be able to put you in contact with some publishers once you get finished!"

The food arrived then and so we moved to their dining table to eat it, continuing making small talk. Despite us seeming to have quite different personalities, we seemed to get on really well and had an enjoyable evening. Had it not been for the jetlag, we would have probably stayed longer. Before we left, they invited us along to a get-together later in the week with some of their other friends. I was quite glad. I had been worried about not knowing anybody in Metropolis; Jon would at least have work colleagues (who would have to at least pretend to like him with him being their boss). It seemed like this was potentially an opportunity to acquire a whole friendship group. Plus it was always nice to have couple-friends (we'd been on quite a few double dates etc with a couple a while back, but they broke up which put a stop to that and, thinking about it, we never really saw either of them much afterwards)

To be continued...


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter two   
We spent the first few days getting the apartment set up (buying things we'd not brought, unpacking the rest of the stuff when it arrived) and exploring the city a bit. We didn't venture too far from the apartment, just finding the major shopping areas etc. When we went to Lois and Clark's get-together (which was in a nearby bar with about half a dozen other people), some of them were surprised about how little of the city we had seen.   
"It's a good job Lois brought you along!" exclaimed Marnie, one of the people there (and probably the loudest), "Someone needs to rectify that! What are you doing on Saturday afternoon? We've got to show you around town! We'll see the major sites, then the more important part; explore the major bars! Come on, I'm not taking no for an answer!"

So that's what we did. There was us, Marnie, Lois, and Tim and Nancy (one of the other couples). Clark "couldn't make it", an excuse I discovered they were used to (but did not yet know why).We had a nice time. The tour was to be honest, more of a bar-crawl than a tourist tour, but we did get to see some of the other sites (and figure our way round a bit more, although I don’t think I learnt much about how to find our later stops that day…). They seemed to be happily adopting us into their friendship circle. 

It seemed weird on Monday when Jon went off to his first day at work, leaving me alone in the apartment. I wasn't sure what to do with myself. I knew this was the time I was supposed to be writing my book, but just didn't seem to feel like it. I don't think I wrote a single word that whole week. When we had Lois and Clark over for a meal (I cooked, making use of all my new kitchen equipment whilst it still had that exciting newness that otherwise dull items seem to have), Lois asked how my book was going. I said that I'd "not really got started yet", not wanting to say that I'd not got started at all. 

The following week I felt I needed to at least do some writing, since that was what I promised myself this sabbatical would be about. I worked on one of my older ideas. I was quite pleased with what I did write, but knew in the back of my mind that I didn't have enough plot development in this book to ultimately get it anywhere.

I got into the habit of walking around the area, trying to take in the city and get inspiration for a new idea. I started reading The Daily Planet too, partly to find out more about the city, and partly because Lois dropping a not so subtle hint had made me decide to give it another chance. I looked up old articles about Superman on the website too (many of which had been written by Lois, and a few were by Clark too, although his seemed to be less focused on Superman, and more about the details of the crimes Superman had prevented). I'd not heard most of the stories before; back in the UK, I had only really heard about Superman's major exploits, whereas here there were details about small scale crimes and minor incidents that he was preventing/saving people from. I kind of felt like I was getting a different side to him; how his city saw him, not how the world saw him. There were some complaints and criticisms of him, but on the whole, the press seemed to be positive (particularly from The Daily Planet, which hardly seemed to have a bad word about him, which is understandable). 

I kept hoping that I might catch a glimpse of Superman in person. That didn't happen to the following week. Jon and I were just leaving the apartment building with Lois and Clark to meet some of their friends at the bar again, when we heard a loud noise which sounded to be coming from a few blocks away. I couldn't properly tell what it was, but it sounded like it might be a large road collision or something. As soon as we heard it, Clark was dashing away down one of the side roads in the general direction of the noise.  
"Got to go…" was all he shouted as he ran away. Lois had looked slightly surprised by the noise, but not at all by Clark's sudden disappearance.  
"He's off to cover the story," she explained, "It's always good to be first on the scene."  
"Then why aren't you running off?"  
"We decided we were going to try and stop fighting with each other over stories. We take turns now."  
"How come Clark seems to always be the one who's missing from social gatherings to cover stories then? Well, as far as I've seen/heard…"  
"Maybe I'm quite good at choosing which stories are mine," replied Lois with a cheeky wink. 

Just then, my attention was distracted by a flash of colour flying down the road.  
"Was that Superman!?"  
"Yes, that was. There you go, you guys are proper residents of Metropolis now you've seen Superman fly past."   
It had only been a brief glimpse of him, but I was thrilled. As far as I knew then, that might be the best view of Superman I was going to get…

"Hey, where's Clark?" Marnie asked Lois as we got to the bar. "He's not still working is he?"  
"Yep, there was a car crash or something on our way over here, so he went to go report on it. On the plus side, Rebecca and Jon did get their first sightings of Superman."   
Marnie looked excitedly towards me. "Ooh, you lost your Superman-virginity! What do you think? He's hot, isn't he?" I went a little bit red. I had always liked Superman (come on, the dude can fly! I'll be honest, I had daydreamed what it would be like to do it in mid-air, and what else he could do with his powers, if you know what I mean…). I didn't want to admit that in front of Jon though.  
"Well, he shot down the street so fast we couldn't properly see him." I mean, that was true. Even from photographs, I hadn't had a good view of Superman yet, because the ones in the articles tended to be from a distance, or blurred from him moving. You could tell he had a good body, and that he clearly was handsome, but you couldn't properly admire his face. 

One of the guys (it might have been Tim), swiftly changed the topic. I got the feeling he was a bit sick of hearing how great Superman is. We didn't say any more about him until quite a while later, when we were all getting to the stage where we were thinking of calling it a night, and Clark returned.   
"Oh good, I didn't miss the whole evening," he commented, seeing that we were all still there. He gave Lois a quick kiss.  
"So what was it?" she asked him, "Did you get the story?"  
"Yeah, just handed it in. Basically there was a three car pile up. There was a couple stuck in one of them, but Superman managed to get them both out safely. Think they should all be ok."  
"Superman saves the day again…" noted Tim sarcastically (but not in a spiteful way; you could tell there was a degree of respect as well as exasperation).

After a final drink, we all headed home. Jon and I headed to bed fairly soon after that.  
"You better not be thinking about Superman…" he joked dryly. I actually wasn't, and it's a good thing too, considering what I would discover in a few days' time…


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rebecca comes face to face with danger, and makes a startling discovery.

Chapter three  
I continued to work on my dead-end book, and procrastinate to avoid starting writing another. It was on one of these procrastination trips that I happened to visit a jewellery store. I'm not particularly sure why. I was working past and got distracted by all the shiny jewels so decided to go have a look in. That was something I used to do a lot more before I got married; I used to enjoy admiring all the beautiful engagement rings, daydreaming what my own might look like one day. I was enjoying being able to wear mine all the time now (as a doctor you weren't allowed anything below the elbow except a plain wedding band for hygiene reasons). I skipped the rings; I didn't need to compare mine to others, even if a ring cost a million pounds (well, here it would be dollars), it would mean nothing to me compared to this one. I had my back to the door, admiring some tiaras in a cabinet, when I heard a shout which made my heart stop.  
"EVERYONE ON THE GROUND! THIS IS A ROBBERY! NOBODY MOVE OR TRY AND FUNNY BUSINESS UNLESS YOU WANT TO DIE!" I turned around shocked, seeing three men wearing black balaclavas and brandishing guns. I crouched down on the ground, covering my head with my hands and watching them through the gap.  
"PUT THE JEWELLERY IN THE BAG," they commanded the terrified girl behind the counter, "HURRY UP, BEFORE HE GETS HERE." I realised who the "he" was; they must be referring to Superman. I guess crime must run by different rules in a town patrolled by a Superman. 

They snatched the bags and started making a run out of the door. I thought they were going to get away, but was honestly just glad that they hadn't shot anyone. But suddenly, the men were flying backwards in a flash of blue and red. They lay on the floor of the store, gasping in shock, looking up at a man stood over them. Superman.  
"Don't move," he instructed them, stamping down one of his red boots slightly closer to them. Sirens wailed in the background.

I moved into a more comfortable sitting position, leaning forwards to get a better view. That's when I got yet another shock. I recognised him, Superman. Not just as Superman. It was Clark. Now that I had noticed it, there was no doubt. He looked very different like this, almost a different person, but it was clearly him. How had I not noticed this before?   
"It's you!" I gasped at him. He turned to look at me. "You're Superman!"  
"Why yes I am," he smiled at me, calmly, before turning round to greet the police storming into the building. He waited for them to secure the robbers then flew off, without me having the chance to say anything else to him.

The police took statements from us, before letting us go. Whilst I was waiting, I gave Jon a call. I think I must have worried him because he dashed straight there. Officers initially tried to stop him entering as he tried to run past them, but once they knew he was there for me, they let him through. They'd finished interviewing me by this point anyway, so after a passionate embrace we slowly walked off, his arm round my shoulders, his chest loudly panting as I stayed silent. 

Once we'd got away from the main crowd, he stopped and turned me to face him, looking down into my face.  
"Are you ok?" he asked me, concerned, "What happened?"  
"There was a robbery. Three men. They had guns. They were angry. I didn't know whether they were going to start shooting. They were just running out when Superman arrived. He knocked them down and kept them there until the police arrived." I wondered whether to tell him about Clark being Superman, but didn't feel I'd processed that enough myself to start telling someone else.  
"It's ok," Jon reassured me, "It's all going to be ok."

We didn't say anything else the rest of the short walk home. I was feeling slightly better by then. I sat down on the sofa as Jon made me a cup of tea. He kept hovering around me, looking concerned as I drunk it.  
"Seriously, I'm fine. I was scared, but it's ok now. It all turned out ok. You should go back to work," I told him.  
"I'm not leaving you alone after this!"  
"Yes, you are. I'll be here when you get back. You've only been working there a few weeks, I don't want you getting in trouble already!"  
"I don't get in trouble, I'm the boss."  
"But you have bigger bosses. Plus I can only imagine how helpless they all are without you!" I joked. It seemed to reassure him to see me smile, so he reluctantly agreed to go.

Once he'd gone, I got my laptop out. There was something I needed to research. I started by re-examining all the photos of Superman out there. There was still the issue of not being to see his face very clearly on them, but now that I knew, I could still tell it was Clark. I read over some of the articles again. It explained why Clark's seemed to focus on the incidents and not Superman; he probably thought it was quite self-involved to write in detail about himself. I looked at Lois' articles again too. I wondered when she found out who he was. I would have thought she must have worked it out pretty quickly, but her early articles on Superman definitely gave the impression she didn't. I tried to find out more about Clark. The Daily Planet website had little bios about its main reporters, but it didn't really say anything that he hadn't told me himself. 

At this point I felt bad. I probably shouldn't be researching my friend. If I wanted to know things, I should ask him myself. The gang was meant to be meeting at the bar again that evening, so I thought I'd talk to him then.

Jon was quite surprised when I was still up for going out that evening, he thought I would have wanted to stay in. I argued that the sooner things got back to normal (well, our new normal, which still wasn't entirely established) the better. 

When we got to the bar, everyone was acting like everything was normal.  
"Hey guys!" called Marnie as she saw us approaching. "How you been?"  
"Well actually, today's not been that good. I ended up getting caught up with a robbery at the jewellers." They all looked quite shocked.  
"OMG! I reported on that! What was it like? What happened? I need all the details!" exclaimed Lois, scrambling round in her bag for a notebook. I think Jon shot her a very dirty look for that, thinking she was more interested in getting the story than how I was. She calmed down a bit and gave me what I think was meant to be a reassuring smile.  
"Are you ok?" Clark asked in a gentle tone, "That must have been terrifying!" I shot him a weird look but he didn't seem to pick up on it. He didn't seem to be giving any indication or acknowledgement that we saw each other there.

I told them all about the robbery. Lois in particular asked me a lot of questions. Clark continued to make no reference to the fact he was Superman, and neither did anyone else. I assumed that was just what they had all decided to do, keep up the pretence that they didn't know (because surely they must all know; they'd all known Clark a lot longer than I had. They had to have realised). I guessed it was easier to think of their friend as Clark Kent: reporter, and not Superman: superhero. I decided I should probably go along with it too, so made no mention to realising the identity of Superman.

"They really seem to love Superman," Jon commented to me when we got home. A lot of the discussion in the bar had been about him.  
"Yeah, well of course they would."  
"Yeah, I know he's a hero and everything, but still."  
"You haven't noticed yet have you?"  
"Noticed what?"  
"About Superman and Clark…" I raised my eyebrows and made a hinting face. Jon looked surprised.  
"Really?"  
"Well, yeah. It's obvious when you notice it, isn't it? But don't say anything, I think everyone just pretends they don't know."  
"Wow!"  
"Yeah. He seems so much different when you know."

To be continued...


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rebecca has to use her medical skills when Superman shows up bleeding...

Chapter four  
We didn't say anything else on the matter after that. Life continued very much as it had been doing (except that Jon went bright red next time we saw Clark, but his awkwardness died down after a short while). I was still struggling thinking of an idea for my book, but was doing less procrastination walks now. I still went out of course; I wasn't trapped in the flat by fear, but I avoided the area around the jewellers, and didn't go in any other places that looked like prime robbery targets (e.g. banks, designer stores, other jewellers) either. 

I was just heading out one day, thinking of going to the shops to buy food. This was something I did most days now, rather than doing a weekly shop as I would have done back in England (as now I didn't have a car so had to carry all my shopping back with me). As I got to the ground floor of the apartment block, I heard a crash coming from the alley at the back. I'd not actually used the back door to the building before, but carefully creaked it open, peering round, ready to slam the door back closed again if I didn't like what I saw. I wasn't expecting what I did see; Superman staggering towards the door, bent over and clutching his side.  
"Clark!" I gasped shocked (though he was dressed as Superman, now I knew who he was, that was the name that it seemed natural to call him). He looked up, surprised, and continued to stagger towards me. That's when I noticed the blood.  
"Oh my God! You're bleeding!" I started pulling my phone from my bag. "I'll call 999. No, it's 911 here isn't it?"  
"No, don't call." He'd reached the building by this point. He put an arm around my shoulder to help support himself and shuffled along the hallway towards the lifts.  
"But you've been stabbed!" I protested.  
"Shot."  
"I thought you was bullet-proof!?"  
"It was a Kryptonite bullet."  
"What?"  
"Kryptonite. It's my weakness." He stumbled into the lift and pressed the button for our floor. "I need your help. You need to get the bullet out."  
"Oh, no, that's not a good idea. I know they always do that in films, but it's the bullet hole which is the main problem now, not the bullet that made it. If we remove it, you'll just bleed more."  
"No, it's Kryptonite. It's poisoning me. Hopefully if we can get it out, then I'll heal." The lift doors opened and we headed out again. He was clearly getting weaker; I was now supporting most of his weight and nearly dragging him along. It wasn't exactly easy. He was quite heavy, and I don't have super strength. I managed to wriggle an arm into my bag to grab my keys and let us into my apartment. Clark flopped down onto the sofa whilst I ran out looking for anything that would help. I barely had anything medical with me at all. I hadn't bothered bringing most of it across. All I had was a very basic first aid kit (which would be next to useless here) and my stethoscope (something I had been unable to leave behind; I had had it since medical school, and I felt it represented an important part of my identity. It had been with me throughout my career so far. Engraved into it was my old name; my maiden name). I grabbed them both anyway, along with a clean towel for him to press against the wound, and a pair of tweezers and some sharp nail scissors. It was nothing even slightly resembling a surgical kit, but it would have to suffice.   
"Here, press this against it." I said handing him the towel, "I just need to go try sterilise these quickly."  
"No, don't bother."  
"But currently you’d be bound to get an infection, even if we get you some antibiotics afterwards."  
"Kryptonian physiology." He was sounding weaker. Each word seemed to be a struggle. "Get the bullet out. Then I'll heal."

He lay back on the sofa, and I pushed it forwards slightly so his wound was right under the lights. I pulled on a pair of latex gloves from the first-aid kit, knelt down next to him and peered into the wound. I could just see something green buried quite deep. I cut his costume aside some more out of the way. The skin around the bullet hole had green lines streaming away from it. I cautiously inserted the tweezers into the hole.  
"Do it," he muttered. I pincered the green thing I could see and pulled. Clark winced but didn't scream. At this stage, I'm not even sure he would have been able to. I gazed at what I'd removed. It was green and translucent, looking almost like glass. It was clearly a bullet. I could make out the stereotypical shape, but it must have shattered on impact. Some of it was probably still in there. I put the tweezers back in, trying to move to skin around to see if I could see inside. These were far from ideal conditions. Better lighting would have been useful for a start. I realised I was probably going to have to cut the wound a bit wider if I was going to get all the fragments out, and it sounded like that was essential. This didn't follow any of the normal rules of surgery, it wasn't like any of the operations I saw back in my early days of training (and even back then, I had known I wasn't going to become a surgeon). I intrepidly cut into a bit of the skin with my scissors. I wasn't even sure whether it would cut; I didn't really understand how the rules of Superman's invulnerability/current vulnerability worked. But it did cut, so I did the same again with some of the muscle underneath, then used the two tools as levers to pull open the hole. I could see more shards of the bullet now. One by one, I picked them out. I poked around the wound a bit more, but couldn't see any more Kryptonite fragments. I must have got them all out. 

I pushed back the muscle and skin into place and pressed back down on the wound with the towel.  
"Clark!" I called to him. He didn't answer, his eyes remaining closed. I gently shook him. "Clark!" No response. I was worried. What should I do now? The only thing that reassured me at all was that I could see his chest gently move with breathing. Should I properly assess his vital signs etc? (Would they even mean anything; how similar is Kryptonian physiology to human?) Should I call for help? Should I try and sew up the wound (I didn't know what effect inserting a foreign material would have on his body). I removed the towel again to inspect the wound. Were the green lines running from it regressing? Was the wound slightly smaller than it was? I watched to try and see if I could see it healing. How fast should he heal? Should he have healed already? Would it take days? I watched intensely. After what seemed like forever but was probably only a minute, I managed to convince myself that the green lines were in fact regressing, the bleeding was decreasing, and the edges of the bullet hole were slowly closing up. The rhythmic movement of his chest was getting stronger too. He was healing. I probably just needed to wait. 

I grabbed the pieces of Kryptonite I had removed and moved them into the kitchen. I didn't want to leave him like this, but didn't know the potency of this stuff. It might be affecting his healing by being near him. I'm not sure whether moving it did make any difference, but potentially it did, as the wound looked better when I returned. There was no doubt about it; he definitely was healing. Hopefully it would be enough. 

I sat and watched his skin slowly healing over, until the bullet hole was gone and just a scab remained (and at this rate, that wouldn't be there for that much longer). It was fascinating to see the process of healing at this super speed. I wouldn't even hope to understand how his cells replicated that fast, and how they managed to stay regulated at that rate of replication. 

I was thinking about the biology behind wound repair when I heard Clark mutter. He tried to sit up but I gently pushed him down, to prevent him from tearing back open his healing wound. Clearly he wasn't fully healed yet, or I wouldn't have been nearly strong enough to do that.  
"Clark, you're ok. Stay still, you were shot," I explained to him, "It was a Kryptonite bullet. I got it out. It had shattered on impact, but I'm fairly sure I managed to get all the fragments out. I wasn't sure whether I should use stitches on the wound, but it seems to have healed up pretty well on its own." By this point, the wound looked weeks old. Of course, that didn't tell me how well healed it was beneath the skin, but I had to assume his healing factor had worked there too. "Do you need me to get you anything?" I asked, "A drink perhaps? Or should I call someone? Lois? I should have called her before, shouldn't I…"  
"No, it's fine, thank you," Clark said, sounded a lot stronger than before. He carefully swung his legs round off the sofa and sat up (this time I didn't stop him). "You've done more than enough. You got the bullet out. You saved me. Thank you. I mean it. I can't thank you enough."  
"It's fine. It's my job. Well, was my job. Kind of. I'll be honest, that was the first Kryptonite bullet I've removed during my medical career. First bullet of any kind actually. But what matters is that we got it out, and you're ok. You can go back to saving people." He smiled at that, then looked slightly confused, like he was thinking something through.  
"I was wondering, how did you know? That I was Superman?" He looked down at his blood-stained costume. "Well actually, how did you know I was Clark Kent?" 

I was slightly taken aback by that. "You know I know. You admitted it!"  
"What, when?"  
"When you stopped the robbers. I realised who you was and asked you about it, and you confirmed it!"  
"No, I didn't…"  
"Yes, you did. I was like 'You're Superman!' and you was like 'Yes I am'."  
"Well, I was Superman. I hadn't realised you meant you knew who I was. If that was the case, surely it would have been more accurate for you to have said 'You're Clark Kent'?"  
"No. Well, technically I guess yes, but I see you as Clark Kent. I was shocked to realise Clark Kent was Superman!"  
"How did you realise?"  
"Is it not obvious? I recognised you! I figured you'd accepted that people you know will know who you are, otherwise you'd wear a mask."  
"People I know don't know who I am. Well, obviously Lois does, and clearly you do, but none of the rest do. As far as I know anyway."  
"How do they not know? How do they not recognise you when they see you as Superman?"  
"They don't. I guess they don't expect to see me, so don't."  
"Oh. Well you probably won't be all that keen that I told Jon then?"  
"Jon knows?" Clark sounded doubtful.  
"Yes, I pointed it out the day of the robbery. It took him a while to get it."  
"I'm not so sure he did… What exactly did you say?"  
"I can't remember my exact words. I just asked if he'd noticed anything about Clark Kent and Superman."  
"Well, I think that might just explain a slightly strange conversation he had with me the other day. You might have implied I was Superman, but I'm pretty sure that's not what he inferred…"  
"Why, what did he say?"  
"I think your husband thinks Clark Kent and Superman are in a secret gay relationship. Or maybe a not so secret gay relationship. I didn't correct him. Technically it's not the most inaccurate belief in the world. I mean, Superman is always ripping Clark Kent's shirt off. And he spends the night in Clark Kent's bed…" I didn't know what to say to that. I think I just stood with my jaw hanging open. "I imagine you might want to correct him after today though. I don't mind. It's up to you. I'm not going to ask you to lie to your husband. But it is potentially dangerous to know my secret."  
"Plus it will blow his mind. If he came up with a whole other story when I tried to show him the truth, maybe he's not ready for it."  
"Well, it's up to you. Just let me know what you decide. And don't go round telling anyone else of course." He stood up. "I'll see you later."  
"You're leaving!?" I asked, shocked. "You were out cold ten minutes ago!"  
"I have to go. I need to get myself cleaned up [he indicated at the state of his costume], then go out and find the person who put a bullet in me."  
"But what I've they've got more bullets? Don't expect me to spend any more of my day picking them out of you!" I joked (but not fully covering up my concern). "Are you even strong enough to fly right now?"  
"We'll see when I jump out the window…" I gasped at that. "I'm joking!" He hovered in mid-air to demonstrate. "Don't worry, I'll be fine. Thanks so much again!" With that, he opened my front door and was gone.

I sat around, processing what had just happened. That was when I noticed the time; Jon would be home any minute. I was still wearing my blood-covering latex gloves, the tweezers and scissors lay on the coffee table, and the blood-soaked towel on the sofa. Whether or not I was going to tell Jon about what happened, this was not the way. For a start he would probably faint (he was not a fan of the sight of blood, something my medic friends and I ribbed him for), and I had had enough of unconscious men in my apartment for one day. I was meant to be on my sabbatical. Any blood I came across was meant to be fictional, and in the form of literary word.

To be continued...


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter five

I decided not to tell Jon about what had transpired that afternoon. I didn't like the idea of lying to him, but thought that was probably for the best. The fact he had misinterpreted my implication indicated that his mind didn't really want to know the truth (because normally we're quite good at understanding what each other is saying). His world view was less compatible with his friend having superpowers (I think even the fact Superman existed still upset him a little bit). Or at least this is all what I told myself. Maybe I had other reasons subconsciously.

So when he asked me how my day was, I didn't say much, and let him assume that it had been as uneventful as usual. He'd had quite a stressful day at work, so we were both glad to let him talk more. I think the only time he was at all suspicious was when he asked if we were heading to the bar to meet the gang; I think I must have looked a bit surprised/worried for a second about that, but he didn't say anything and we let it drop.

There was only Tim and Nancy there when we got there, so we made slightly awkward small-talk. There was nothing wrong with them, but I knew we and them were never really going to be more than mutual friends, joined by the group, but not really friends in our own right. We just didn't click. We all tried to act like we weren't impatient for more of our friends to get there. I wanted to see Clark, firstly so that I could check that he was ok, but also so we could talk some more. Not that this would be a good place to talk, with all our friends around. I wanted to chat with Lois too. She seemed like the kind of person who could make light of the situation and make it feel more normal again.

But although soon more people arrived, none of them were Lois or Clark. I told myself that wasn't strange. For a start, people didn't tend to always come to the bar each time the gang was meeting; people had other things on too. Yes, so far at least one of Lois and Clark had been there on evenings we had, but that was partly because they introduced us to the group so we tended to go when they did. Also, with what had gone down this afternoon, it was understandable that a drink with friends wouldn't be on the top of their to-do list. Clark might still be dealing with the whoever shot him. Or maybe they just wanted to spend the evening together after a near-death experience. 

I had to try and act like everything was normal. Laugh at Marnie's very loud jokes. I don't think anyone really noticed I was distracted. I was quite glad when Jon suggested we head off early. I'd figured by this point Lois and Clark weren't coming, and I wasn't going to get any questions answered tonight.

I lay awake in bed that night, thinking. Wondering about what the consequences could be of being a secret keeper for Superman. Sure, I'd known his secret for a while (although I guess not technically corroborated), but I had thought lots of people knew. It felt more serious on realising it was much more secret than I had assumed. He had warned that it could be dangerous to know his secret. Could knowing lead to consequences?

How come I'd been able to recognise him, work out who he was? Before I had thought it was because it was obvious, but apparently not, if people who had known him for far longer than me hadn't worked it out. Was I assigning pointless meaning to nothing? Maybe it was luck I worked it out? Coincidence? The right circumstances? Maybe it was because I hadn't known Clark long, hadn't properly seen Superman before, that my brain was able to process they were one and the same? If I'd been used to them being two separate people, with developed profiles in my mind, maybe it would have been so much harder for my brain to overlap them?

When I got up the next morning, it was later than expected. Jon had already left for work. Presumably I must have been deep asleep when he got up (due to spending a lot of the night awake) and he didn't want to wake me. I was just stumbling around the apartment in my PJs, getting myself some breakfast, when the doorbell went. 

It was Clark. He was dressed in a suit, his reporter's I.D. hanging from the pocket. He glanced into the flat, maybe just subtly asking me if Jon was in, or maybe checking for himself with his X-ray vision, I'm not sure.  
"Jon's at work. Do you want to come in?" I asked, slightly apprehensively.  
"No, I can't stay. I'm meant to be out on a story." He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a small metal box. I guess I probably looked quite curious. "This is lead. It's for the bullet. It can't harm me through lead. I should have collected it yesterday but it slipped my mind. I need to take the kryptonite away somewhere safe. Don't want to risk it getting into the wrong hands. Some bad might happen. Well, something like yesterday for an example." He looked worried for a second. "You do still have it, don't you? You didn't just toss it in the trash?"  
"No, don't worry, it's still safe. It's in a cupboard in the kitchen. I cleared it away quickly with the other stuff before Jon got home, and haven't got round to sorting any of it yet."  
"Have you told him?"  
"No. I think for now, that's for the best."  
Clark nodded. I'm not sure whether it was in agreement, or just in recognition of my decision. He handed me the box.  
"Does it matter if there's still blood on the bullet?" I asked.  
"No, as long as all the bullet is in there." 

I took the box to the kitchen and brushed all the bullet fragments in with the tweezers, trying to make sure I didn't miss with any of the pieces. I took one last look at the shards of green crystal. They were almost beautiful. I'd always liked emeralds, and the kryptonite shared more than a passing resemblance. But it was also deadly. Well, to Superman it was. I closed the box carefully and carried it back to the hallway where Clark stood waiting. I slowed as I approached him, half watching for signs the kryptonite was affecting him, even through the box. Nothing happened- he was fine.  
"Thanks" he said, as he pocketed the box. He turned to leave.  
"Wait!" I called out, "I still have questions!"  
"Another time, I promise. I have to go now." He nodded a vague goodbye and walked away down the hallway.

I closed the door then stood distracted in the apartment, not quite sure what I'd been doing beforehand. I walked to the kitchen. My cereal bowl sat abandoned on the side. The cupboard with the blood-covered towel and tweezers etc was still open. I decided to deal with that first. I'd just shoved it all in a plastic bag the day before and stowed it there, and the bits of bullet had been dumped on the shelf in front. I extracted the scissors and tweezers from the bag (the scissors had fallen to the bottom) and put them by the sink. I started rinsing out the towel to get some of the blood out. Instinctively I went to throw it straight in the washing machine, but then I remembered here I didn't have a washing machine in the kitchen- I'd have to go to the communal laundry room in the basement. I thought about this for a second, and dumped the towel back in the bag with the latex gloves instead. I might as well just throw it out. Kryptonian blood might not wash out very well anyway.

I was just re-closing the cupboard door when I noticed something green at the back of the shelf. It was a fragment of the bullet I'd missed. Quite a lot of thoughts passed through my mind at once. I picked it up and carefully looked at it. It was sharp on one side, and almost looked like the head of a scalpel. I knew what I should do is let Clark know, and he could come back with the lead box to collect it. That's not what I did. I swear it wasn't maliciously when I decided to keep it. It wasn't to use against him. It wasn't even for my own protection. I think it was how much it looked like a scalpel blade. I wanted to put a handle on it, and keep it safe, just in case it was needed. No normal blade could cut Superman. What if he came back to me in trouble again, requiring some more impromptu surgery? A kryptonite scalpel would come in handy. 

I put the fragment in a little bag and hid it behind one of the pipes in the back of the bathroom cupboard. The pipes almost certainly weren't lead, but I guess I thought they could be. Plus Jon was unlikely to find it there. I'd taken the chance yesterday that he was unlikely to be looking in the kitchen cupboards, but he probably would look in them occasionally. This seemed a better spot. For now anyway. I would think about it more later, think about how to attach it to a handle later.

To be continued...


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter six  
It was a couple of days later that I got some of my Superman questions answered. It was probably good it wasn't straight away; I'd have probably struggled to keep the fact I still had a piece of Kryptonite secret, but I'd put it to the back of my mind by this point. I'd also had more time to think, and come up with questions. 

It was mid-afternoon and I was sat staring at my laptop. I'd been flipping between various book beginnings for a while, but hadn't added anything to any of them (apart from correcting the odd typo I'd found). The sound of the doorbell distracted me from my blank staring. I shut my laptop and went to answer it. It was Lois.  
"Hey. Just wondering if you wanted to come round and you know, chat…" She gave me a knowing look, indicating that neither of us needed to say what it was we would chat about. "I've heard you've got questions, and I've got a bottle of wine that want opening." She must have noticed me glance at the clock. "Trust me, it's not too early. Particularly after the day I've had at work. Things just weren't writing." I grabbed my keys and shut the door, following her across the hall to their apartment.   
"How's your book going by the way?"  
"Oh God, absolutely nowhere, lol."

Lois poured us both large glasses of wine and we'd just sat down on the sofa when Clark entered the apartment.  
"Oh, hi slowcoach," Lois called to him playfully, "Come join us, considering the fact it's your secret we're discussing." He poured himself a (much smaller) glass of wine from the bottle Lois had plonked on the coffee table in front of her, and sat down in the armchair. They both starred at me expectantly. Ever question I had flew from my mind. After a few seconds Lois burst out in laughter.  
"Well, this is awkward! I'm not really sure how things go, we've never had anyone figure out his secret like this before. I guess you put all us journalists to shame. I spend my life investigating and finding the truth behind a story, but do you know how long it took me to work out the truth about the guy I was working beside every day? I saw a lot of Superman, but couldn't see who he was. And I mean, I saw Superman a lot. He seemed to have to rescue me a lot back then."  
"It was rare to have a day where Lois didn't seem to somehow find herself in mortal peril!" Clark interjected. "And yet it took you, what was it, over a year to work out who I was?" he asked her, slightly smugly.  
"Well, maybe you should have told me the truth when we started going out?"  
"And deny you the satisfaction of working it out for yourself? Never!"

"So no one else has worked it out?" I asked, slightly surprised.  
"There are others who know my secret identity. And some of them did work it out. Or find it out without me telling them anyway. But not really any of the other people who know me here. Well, except one of my friends. You've not met him yet. And he didn't work it out. I had to reveal my secret to him in an emergency once."  
"Is it hard to keep it a secret?"  
"I'm used to it now. I've had lots of practice. I have to remember what Clark knows, and what Superman knows, and make sure I don't reveal things supposedly only the other knows. And I've got very used to making quick exits. Having Lois around helps with that. She's very good at coming up with excuses of where Clark suddenly disappeared off to when there's something dramatic going down."  
"What would he do without me?" she asked me, sarcastically rhetorical.

We talked a lot. I asked all kinds of questions. How come he had superpowers? Was he really an alien? Then why did he look human? Did he wear his Superman costume under his clothes all the time? Even the cape? Clark did a very good job at being patient with me throughout my inquisition. Some questions he answered vaguely, and I took it as a hint not to ask anything else about those topics. There were some secrets he wanted to keep secret. 

I'd lost track of the time when my phone started ringing. It was Jon. I realised he must be home from work and wondering where I was.   
"Tell him to come round. We'll order takeaway again!" Lois suggested. "That's if you're done with asking questions for today?" she added as an afterthought.  
"Yes, I think I've been nosey enough for one day."  
"I'll go grab the menus," Clark announced.  
"And I'll go find more wine," added Lois, picking up the now empty bottle, both of them leaving me whilst I answered the phone.

A short while later, the four of us were sat round the coffee table, glancing through menus and making good progress on the second bottle.   
"Erm, half of these aren't even in Metropolis…" commented Jon, shifting through a pile. "This restaurant's in Gotham, this place is in Star City, Coast City, another in Gotham, Central city…" I looked to Clark nervously, but he seemed unphased.  
"Oh yeah, sorry. Really need to sort that pile out. We've only really ordered from a couple of places recently, so I hadn't noticed I'd mixed in menus we'd got in other places, I just grabbed all the ones that were in the drawer." He took the heap from Jon and passed him a couple off the table. "I think those ones should be in Metropolis at least. Fancy either of them?"

We ordered Thai food in the end. It was a nice evening. There were very few moments where the fact Jon wasn't in on the secret the rest of us knew looked at risk of being an issue. I did wonder at one point whether the conversations would have been different if he was in on the secret too. I started having second thoughts about my decision not to tell him. I felt bad, despite telling myself it was for the best. I don't think he noticed me having the internal dilemma. To be honest, I was pretty drunk by the end of the evening (though I think Lois was even drunker), so he probably assumed that was the reason I had spaced out. 

To be continued...


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rebecca and Lois visit a science lab, where everything is not as it seems...

Chapter seven  
I had a nice quite weekend in with Jon, just the two of us. We spent quite a lot of the time on a Netflix binge. I was kind of sad when he got up on Monday morning to leave for work again. I missed going to work. I enjoyed procrastinating round the apartment etc., but after a few weeks, the novelty was starting to wear off, and I was missing feeling like I'd done something worthwhile. I could hardly count my failed attempts at writing as productive. 

I was just heading out to go to the shops when I came across Lois entering the building.   
"Hey, how's things?"  
"Good thanks. I'm just back to grab something from the apartment, then I'm meant to going to a press conference at that genetics lab on the other side of town." She started as if to continue her dash across the foyer, then stopped and turned to me again. "Are you doing anything right now? Do you want to come with?"  
"To a lab?"  
"Yeah. I mean, you know science right? I never really know what they're talking about at these things. You could help explain it to me."  
"Well, I'm not exactly an expert in genetics. We studied the basics at medical school, but that was a while ago. I've not really kept up with the cutting edge of research."  
"You'll know far more than me. Fancy it?"  
"Yeah sure, why not? It's not like I've got anything better to do."

It was quite busy when we got to the lab (Lois drove us there- the first time I'd been in a car in weeks). The press conference was clearly quite a big deal. I didn't think I was going to get in when I noticed them checking credentials at the door.  
"Lois Lane, Daily Planet," Lois announced confidently, flashing her press pass. The security guard clearly knew who she was. He looked to me. "She's with me." With that, Lois strode off inside, and I nervously followed. The guard didn't try and stop me, so clearly Lois' journalistic reputation carried some weight around here.

We went through and sat in a big presentation hall. Lois filled me in that the lab was supposedly going to announce some big discovery they'd made, and their plans for expansion. The room went quiet when some smug looking guy swept onto the stage. Lois told me what his name was but I don't recall. Apparently he was a big deal in Metropolis, but I'd never heard of him before. He went into a big speech accompanied by flashy infographics.   
"So what did he actually say?" Lois asked me, after he'd left the stage to great applause, "I didn't really follow it all."  
"As far as I can tell, not a right lot. I think he basically just waffled on in meaningless statements, interspersed with scientific terms to sound technical and fancy."  
"He likes to play up to the crowd. One speech is never enough. He'll probably be back later to announce whatever it was he brought us all here to hear."

At this point, someone came on stage to announce that they were going to do tours of the facility. Lois grabbed my arm and steered me towards where guides were entering, so we were nearly at the front of the queue.  
"Come on. If they aren't going to actually tell us anything, then we need to make sure we get a good look for ourselves."

Our guide was making more generic meaningless statements and pointing out well-equipped but boring-looking labs.   
"What's down there?" Lois asked her, indicating at a slightly ominous looking door with 'Authorised Personal Only' written on it.  
"That's where some of our most top secret research goes on. I'm sure you'll be hearing about some of the amazing discoveries we're making in there on another visit." She continued to march the group along onto another shiny corridor. We fell back slightly as another journalist starting enthusiastically asking the guide a question. As we passed a small corridor on the left, Lois pulled me back into it.  
"What?" I whispered, as she indicated for me to be quiet. She waited to make sure the group had left us behind before answering.  
"We're going to go have a nosy around their secret lab. Sounds like that's where they keep the interesting stuff."  
"What!? Are you kidding me!? We can't go breaking into some secret lab. Do you know what will happen if we get caught?"  
"We won't get caught. And if we do, I'll get us out of it. Trust me, I know what I'm doing. This isn't my first day on the job."  
"I still don't think it's a good idea. What will happen if we get arrested? I could lose my medical license! I could get extradited! Even worse, I could not get extradited, and instead locked up in some secret American black site jail!"  
"Dude…" Lois turned to look at me with a look of cynical disapproval, "You clearly watch too many bad action movies."  
She marched off back towards the secret lab. I shrugged my shoulders and followed.  
"How are we even going to get in?"  
"With this," she announced, holding up a white swipe card.  
"Where did you get that!?"  
"Ah, tricks of the trade…" she smiled smugly as she ran it through the card reader and carefully pushed the door open. The hallway behind was empty of people. There were a few lab coats hung up on pegs. Lois grabbed one and put it on, and I did the same. We went through a door into a lab that looked similar to those we had been shown, but slightly less showy. No one was in there.  
"I guess they probably have all the scientists on tour duty today. Lets have a look around."

We had a look around the lab, examining microscope slides, culture plates, and trays with wells filled with liquid, but none of them were particularly interesting; to be honest, even with my vague genetics knowledge, it was difficult to tell what experiments they had been trying to carry out. Lois managed to find a sheet with project titles written on it; most were vague and neither enlightening nor interesting sounding. I didn't get chance to see which one had caught Lois' eye, but clearly one did as she started dashing around the room again looking for something.  
"It's in here!" she announced, gesturing at a door and enthusiastically trying to open it with the swipe card.  
"What is?" I asked, but she wasn't listening, instead still trying to open the door. The reader wasn't accepting the card she had. She gave the card reader a whack. It must have already been damaged because the casing broke open. The door unlocked, but alarms also started blazing in the lab.  
"OH SHIT!" she yelled, as we panicked and dashed through the door.

The room on the other side was much smaller than the lab we'd come from, and was dimly lit. There was more lab equipment, lots of metal cupboards, but what caught our eyes was a series of tanks at the far end.  
"Oh God! Ah those aliens?"  
"No. I think they're human." I normally have a very strong stomach but felt like I was going to barf. The tanks contained what looked like nearly fully grown human fetuses, some wildly mutated.  
"That is not human…" replied Lois, pointing at one that looked to have something resembling wings poking out of its back. 

I heard shouting, probably coming from the main room of the lab.  
"We need to get out of here. Now. This is far more than an ordinary lab. This is some serious, messed up stuff. I mean, there are regulations geneticists have to follow, and this is nowhere near them." We started looking around in panic, but the only exit was back the way we came, into a lab which was probably filling with security, and now we knew about the mutant fetuses, being arrested was probably not the worst thing that could happen.  
"Oh no, what do we do?" I asked, the fear starting to show in my voice. "We're in big trouble, we need…" An idea came to me. "Call Superman!"  
"Oh, no, I'm not calling Clark. I've managed to go eight months without needing to be rescued, I'm not breaking my streak."  
"Dude, we're trapped in a lab with dead mutant babies in tanks, and we're about to get caught! I'm all for being a strong independent woman, but I am concerned I'm soon going to end up being a dead woman! We need rescuing! Call him now!"  
"Fair point," Lois conceded after a moment's consideration, and started manically tapping her phone. A look of horror crossed her face. "There's no signal!"  
"Mine neither!" We looked at each other, not sure what to do.

More shouting came from the main lab. There was clearly multiple security guards in there now.  
"Ok, ok, here's what we'll do," I started, trying to plan despite the terrified chaos going on in my mind. "They know who you are, but they probably won't know who I am. You hide in here, try and get in contact with Clark somehow. I'll go out there and see if I can draw them away. I'm Bavarian fire-drilling this bitch!" Lois started to say something in protest, but I was already marching out of the door before the adrenaline of the decision faded and I chickened out.

"Oh good, security's here!" I announced, trying to put on a big fake smile as everyone in the lab stared at me (which was hard, because there was more people than I expected, and they looked more menacing than I had imagined), "Yeah, the lock on that door is broken, and I mean, that's a bit of a security flaw isn't it? Particularly today when we have all those guests at the lab."  
"Who are you?"  
"I'm… I'm Dr… Foster. You know. I've been working on the project in a lab in England, and I'm over here in the States to check on how it's going on your end!" I gave them all a hopeful smile.

To be continued...


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rebecca and Lois find themselves in trouble at the lab...

Chapter eight  
The door to the basement opened, flooding the dingy room with light. Two men bundled Lois in.  
"Lois! Hi! I'd wave, but it seems I'm tied to a chair. They got you too ey?"  
"Yeah," she replied, giving me a weird look. "Are you ok? You seem kind of stoned right now…"  
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure they stabbed me with something in the fight. Well I guess you probably wouldn't call it a fight. I'm not really sure what went down. Pretty sure I managed to bitch-slap someone though." I paused to try and remember. "I hope they didn't stab me with weird mutant baby juice. Or smallpox. Geneticists like smallpox. Or wait, maybe that's virologists? I'm going to name my firstborn after smallpox. Variola. Var… ri… ola…"  
"Snap out of it!" Lois yelled at me. She kind of surprised me, not least the volume, because I hadn't noticed the guards tie her to the chair next to me. They both let out derisive snorts and left the room, slamming the door and leaving us in near darkness.  
"Sorry… yep. Escape plan! So as you can see, my plan clearly didn't work. Or can't see, I guess, because it's dark…"  
"So you didn't manage to set the fire alarm off?"   
"What? That wasn't the plan! Although thinking about it, that might have been a better plan…"  
"Well, whatever your plan was, I failed too. I had just managed to get into some wifi and was going to send an email off when they caught me."  
"You were going to send an SOS email request?" I asked cynically. "Actually, wait yeah, that did kind of work for Moss and the fire on the 'IT Crowd'… " I started badly singing a poorly remembered quote from the episode: "Oh one one eight, nine nine nine, do do do do do, do do do. Three." Lois chose to ignore that altogether. 

"So…" I started after a few moments awkward silence. "What do we do now?"  
"I guess hope someone somehow realises we're in trouble and rescues us before they murder us. Cos they've tied us up in their creepy-ass basement. Clearly they're not just going to have us arrested. They want to make sure we won't be telling anyone about their secret experiments. They'll want to shut us up. Permanently."  
"Maybe they won't murder us?" I asked in a decidedly less concerned tone. "Maybe they'll decide to use us as baby mamas for more of their mutant babies or something."  
"What?"  
"Think about it, they're clearly incubating their weird experiments somehow. And if they're doing it in a machine, then why haven't they gone public with it? Imagine how much money you could make from manufacturing a electronic womb? They wouldn't need creepy illegal off books experiments, they could be legit, and like loaded!"

 

Luckily that chain of thought was interrupted by the door opening again and an angry-looking man entering, turning on the light.   
"Oh, dude, no!" I complained, screwing my eyes closed against the light. He ignored me, taking a spare seat and sitting on it backwards in front of us, in that stereotypical 'I mean business' kind of way.  
"Ms Lane," he started, looking intensely at Lois. He turned to me, more nonchalantly. "And whoever you are."  
"I am you're worst nightmare!" I decided to declare. "You will let me go!" He looked unfazed.  
"I think not. Now, would either of you like to tell us what you were doing, trespassing in our lab?"  
"We were invited!" Lois exclaimed, "We were on a tour and got a bit lost, and your goons decided to lock us down here! You know who I am! I won't stand for this! The world will here about how you've treated us!"  
"No, they won't. Let's not get bogged down in pretence. We all know you didn't get lost. You went noseying where you shouldn't have been noseying, and found out about something you're not meant to know about. And we can't let you just walk out of here and go telling anyone, can we? So unfortunately, you and your friend here are going to have to have an unfortunate accident. You can't have it here of course; imagine what that would do to our insurance premiums? Visitors being killed onsite! It would draw more inconvenient inspections! So instead I think the two of you are going to be involved in a tragic car accident after leaving an interesting but uneventful press conference here."  
"Why are you doing the whole evil villain thing of telling us your plan?" I asked. Lois shot me a look that seemed to imply 'shut up!'  
"Why, we wanted to give you a chance to say if you have any last words. We can't tell anyone them of course, but it's the thought that counts! Plus, I thought I'd ask if you have any suggestions for improvements to our experiments? More wings? You can't have too many wings, can you?"  
"You won't get away with this!" I decided to shout, deciding if we were getting into stereotypes, I might as well play along. "We… we know Superman! He'll come and rescue us!"  
"But how will he know? As far as I'm aware, telepathy isn't one of his powers. He won't know you're in need of rescuing until far too late. The press conference is just finishing upstairs. I imagine no one at The Daily Planet will wonder where you've got to for ages yet. And I know you didn't contact anybody before we found you, because we have both of your phones, and no messages have been sent from them. There's no signal in that lab anyway. People keep complaining about that."  
"SUPERMAN!!!" I started screaming. "COME RESCUE US!!!" The man put a hand over my mouth to stop me shouting, removing it after giving me a good stare indicating not to try that again.   
"He's gonna be super pissed that you've murdered us," I muttered, sulkily. "Well, super pissed about Lois. Mildly peeved about me…" Lois looked at me frustrated again, indicating for me to stop talking.   
"He won't know. Like everyone else, he will believe your demises are tragic accidents," the man smirked. "And speaking of, we might as well be getting on with it, might we, since you've got nothing interesting to say? I thought we'd best check first you weren't someone interesting, since you're not a journalist and appear to have some kind of scientific background. That's why we decided to help loosen your tongue to check. Thought you might be part of a secret investigation, or corporate espionage from one of our competitors or something. But you're just a nobody, aren't you, who Miss Lane dragged along because she's too stupid to understand even basic science?" We both gave him even dirtier looks than we had already been throwing in his direction. 

"I need the bathroom!" I suddenly announced after a few seconds of silence.  
"Well, don't worry, in a few minutes you'll be dead and so that won't matter."  
"Let me go to the loo!" I exclaimed, "Otherwise I'll pee myself on purpose, then you'll have to carry a corpse that is covered in pee, and that won't be very nice!"  
"Oh, fine!" he agreed, exasperated. He spoke into his radio. A woman entered the room. "Take her to the bathrooms. The ones by the lab; we don't want anybody seeing her. Then bring her straight back." She roughly untied me from the chair, leaving my hands bound behind my back, and manhandled me from the room. She was pretty big, strong looking, but I got the sense she was reasonably smart too. Not one of the stereotypical big dumb henchmen/women you see in films. I figured it wasn't worth trying to trick her and escape; I had a feeling she would quite happily beat the crap out of me if I tried anything. 

She checked the stall before she reluctantly untied my hands and let me go in (after making a show of highlighting the fact she was carrying a gun). I had no chance of trying to escape through a window; there was a skylight in the room but I had no hope of reaching it and if I did, it didn't look like it opened anyway. I was going to try and take my time considering this was likely to be the last piss I ever took, but she must have been listening intently through the door, because as soon as I'd finished she was banging on the door and shouting that she would break it down if I didn't open it.

When I turned on the tap to wash my hands, it shot water at me and I let out a little screech. She glared at me angrily for that, the kind of look that says "if you make another sound…", and gestured at the gun again. I stayed silent. Well, for a few seconds. 

Suddenly there was the sound of smashing glass and a red-blue blur shooting through the skylight. I screamed again and threw myself on the ground in the opposite direction. I covered my ears as I heard gunshots ring out. After a few seconds and what sounded like a struggle, it went quite again, so I nervously sat up and turned back around.

"Superman!" I exclaimed jubilantly, "You've come to save us! Yey!" He looked at me with a kind of reassuring smile, mixed with mild confusion. "Oh, no wait, do I call you Superman here?" I said, confusing myself, pulling a kind of weird thinking face.  
"Yes, you do…" he replied very pointedly, indicating very obviously at the henchwoman whilst he tied her arms with the rope that had tied mine.  
"Are you ok?" he asked (in a tone which suggested he had very much picked up on the fact I was acting strangely), "What is going on here? Where's Lois?"  
"So we came here for the press conference but it was boring so we snuck into a lab and we found the creepy mutant baby jars and they found us and they injected me with some shit then they tied us up in the basement and the dude told us his evil plan and they were going to murder us and crash the car but I needed the loo so we came here to the loo…"  
"What? Never mind, you can explain later. Can you stand? Is Lois still in the basement?". I curled my legs underneath myself, and used the sink to pull myself to my feet in a slightly childish manner, completing the manoeuvre with jazz hands.  
"Yeah, probably. She's probably with evil boss dude."  
"Ok. Well the police are just arriving. I'll take you out to them, then I'll go get Lois." He turned to the henchwoman, "and you, stay here!"

He carefully scooped me up in his arms and flew back out of the skylight. Most days I probably would have really enjoyed the flight. I have always wanted to be able to fly. It should have been a dream come true. Instead, in my befuddled state, I screeched the whole way. He didn't say anything, but I imagine I probably hurt his ears, particularly considering the fact he has super-hearing. He put me down on the ground outside the lab, where a collection of police cars were starting to congregate, and, after having a quick word with a nearby cop (which I didn't catch), he flew back off into the building again.

To be continued...


End file.
